Subject: S7-29-22: WebForm Comments from Anonymous
From: Anonymous
Affiliation: Individual Investor through TD Ameritrade

Mar. 30, 2023



March 30, 2023

 Disclosure of Order Information S7-29-22
The Commission is proposing changes to rule 605 of Regulation NMS to include more information about broker executions.

Currently, brokers have to file 606 reports quarterly.

In Dec 2022: FINRA, along with the SEC, sent out risk alerts regarding the lack of compliance with the 606 reports. In the report FINRA cited a list of issues with the 606 reporting compliance. The findings consisted of firms publishing inaccurate information in the quarterly report on order routing. There were also issues with Incomplete Disclosures  Not adequately describing material aspects of their relationships with disclosed venues in the Material Aspects disclosures portion of the quarterly report.

While I do support the idea and definitely agree with the need to be more transparent, one would expect brokers to be as non-compliant with the new 605 reports, and this will provide little to no benefit to retail. The 605 reports are only as useful as the accuracy of data it contains. Again, these rules would have to be appropriately enforced. As compliance to date has been embarrassingly low, the Commission should make it a priority to increase fines and penalties for violations. The lack of compliance with 606 reports communicates a tendency for funds and firms to send out bad data to obscure their own situation. Companies that sell market data are then damaged, as faith in the markets overall are damaged. Why pay for data if its full of lies?